Hope Chest
What Hope Chest Actually Looks Like
Hope Chest is a rich, dark brown with the kind of depth that anchors a room without feeling heavy-handed. It sits in that range where brown meets warm neutral, the color of aged wood or worn leather. At its LRV it absorbs a fair amount of light, so rooms feel enveloping and grounded rather than open and airy. In strong natural light it shows its warmth clearly. In low or north-facing light it can read almost as a near-black brown, so the room and its lighting matter a lot here.
Hope Chest Undertones
The RGB values tell the story: red and green channels are close, with blue noticeably lower. That translates to a warm undertone with a slight green-brown quality, the kind of tone you see in raw umber or walnut. It is not orange-brown or red-brown. It leans toward a muted, earthy warmth that keeps it from feeling candy-like or overly saturated.
Where Hope Chest Works Best
Because of its low LRV, Hope Chest works best where you want intimacy and depth rather than brightness. A home office, a library, a dining room, or a bedroom where a cocoon-like feel is the goal. It is an interior-only color, and it rewards rooms with good ambient or artificial lighting. Avoid using it in small spaces that already feel dark unless that effect is intentional.
Where to put Hope Chest
A dining room is one of the best fits for Hope Chest. The depth of the color makes candlelight and warm pendant lighting glow, and the space gets used in the evening when the low LRV is a feature rather than a drawback. Pair it with a warm white on the ceiling and natural wood furniture.
Hope Chest gives a library or office a serious, focused atmosphere. Floor-to-ceiling bookshelves in natural wood, a leather chair, and a good task lamp all work with this color. The warmth keeps it from feeling cold or corporate.
In a bedroom it creates a genuinely restful, enveloping environment. Keep the bedding in warm neutrals or dusty earth tones. A lighter ceiling is important here so the room does not read as a cave, even if that is partly the appeal.
A well-lit entry or hallway can carry Hope Chest well as a dramatic first impression. Keep the trim bright and make sure artificial lighting is warm-toned rather than cool, or the color will shift toward muddier territory.
What to Pair With Hope Chest
No coordinating colors are listed in our database for this color, so pairings here are drawn from established color knowledge. Hope Chest pairs well with warm creamy whites on trim and ceilings, muted terracotta or clay tones as accents, and natural materials like linen, jute, and unlacquered brass hardware.
You Might Also Like
Colors that clash with Hope Chest
If adjacent rooms are painted in cool or blue-gray tones, the warm brown undertone of Hope Chest can look muddy or disconnected at the transition.
Bright cool whites with blue or gray undertones will fight the warmth in Hope Chest and make the wall color look dull rather than rich.
In a north-facing or interior room without good artificial light, Hope Chest can go very dark and flat, losing the warmth that makes it appealing.
Common questions
The LRV is 13.13, which is quite low. On a scale where 0 is pure black and 100 is pure white, Hope Chest sits close to the dark end. It will absorb rather than reflect light, making rooms feel smaller and more intimate. Plan your lighting accordingly.
It is listed as an interior color. Benjamin Moore offers most interior colors in a range of sheens from flat through high-gloss. For a deep color like this, eggshell or matte tends to look the most refined on walls, while semi-gloss or satin works on trim.
Deep, dark colors often require a tinted primer plus two coats of topcoat for even coverage, especially over a previously light wall. Ask your Benjamin Moore retailer to tint the primer toward the finish color to reduce the number of coats needed.
The Benjamin Moore code is CSP-1050. The hex and RGB values are displayed in the color spec block on this page.